


A Reason To Live

by Higgles123



Category: The Revenant (2016)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:00:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23740456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Higgles123/pseuds/Higgles123
Summary: John Fitzgerald merely survives, but now he's found someone who makes it want to live
Relationships: John Fitzgerald/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 12





	A Reason To Live

She was beautiful. That was his first thought. The second was what the hell was she doing out here? She didn’t belong on the frontier. She belonged in some big house with servants to do her bidding and make sure those soft hands of hers stayed soft and delicate. Her hair was the colour of the roaring bonfire in the middle of the field, and he had a hard time imagining that beneath that porcelain exterior lurked the true temper of a redhead. He had a hard time imagining that a face so radiant could ever screw up in disgust or anger; and he refused to even envisage for a second how she would look when she cried. 

John Fitzgerald was by no means a sentimental man, but even he could appreciate the beautiful things he had seen in life. The first flurry of virgin snow as it danced around in the sky as though it had been sent down from heaven itself; the first flower rearing its head in spring; a pink and orange dusk that could have come right out of a painting. Even he, a man as hardened to life as he was, could see the beauty and the wonder in the simplest things the earth had to offer. But in his whole life he had seen nothing that compared to her. 

He didn’t believe in God or fate, but without a shadow of a doubt he knew there to be a reason that he was here and so was she. Another few months and he would be gone trapping for the last half of the year, and usually when he was back at the place his body called home he avoided people as much as he could. He sold his pelts and then closed the door on the world. The only reason he had come to the wedding party tonight was because after the first whore he paid for when he arrived back in town, the lust and ache that had built up in him during that long winter was satiated. He had fucked that whore hard and desperately, not caring about her pleasure or his, just about getting that much needed release. But now his body craved more. Sure he could pay a working girl to put her lips around his cock and tease his balls until he spilled himself down her throat, but there was something even more satisfying about it when a man didn’t have to pay. Whores made all the right noises but they weren’t genuine. He wanted to hear a woman pant and gasp and make those sweet little sounds beneath him because he was just that good and not because he had paid a pretty penny for her theatrics. 

So he had sat close to the fire, watching people like a hawk searching for a mouse down below on the ground, waiting for the unsuspecting prey who would fall for his charms and give him what he wanted. One or two women caught his eye, busty and brash and no doubt the sort of women who had been with more men than he’d had hot meals, but they would be free and they would be easy. However, a sound across the fire from him had caught his attention and that was when he had seen her; head thrown back giggling at something the girl she sat with said. From that moment those other women went right out of his mind. 

He knew he was staring, and he knew she knew he was staring. Every so often she’d glance in his direction and blush when she saw he was watching her unashamedly. He felt like he could have opened his mouth and said her name, he didn’t know why. But he bet that she had a pretty name, maybe some sort of flower. John realised for the first time in his life he wanted to know a woman in every sense of the word. He wanted to worship her body with his own and then lay down beside her and talk about their hopes and their dreams. For a man whose only dream was getting enough pelts each winter to make enough money to survive for the rest of the year, he knew that whatever she asked of him he would do it without question. He would walk the highest mountain or run right through an Arikara camp just to see her smile and know he had been the one to put the smile there. 

“She’s a damn pretty piece, ain’t she? What I’d give to see her panting and writhing underneath me before the night is out.”

John looked up and into the blackened teeth that were grinning down at him. The pot bellied oaf who he didn’t recognise smelt of stale sweat and horse shit, and the very knowledge that his eyes roamed all over her and imagined those things was enough to drive John insane. For some reason, the knowledge that he himself had imagined that very same thing was different. John clenched his jaw together that he felt one of his teeth at the back crack.

“You talking about her like she’s a slab of meat,” John murmured, spitting out the remnants of his tooth. He didn’t need to raise his voice for the warning in his tone to be understood. 

“Can you blame me? Look at her. Even covered up in all them clothes, it’s plain to see she’s got a body just begging to be touched. Bet she ain’t never been with no man either; she’s got that look about her. By the end of the night she’d certainly know how to treat a man that’s for sure,” the fat man chortled. John slid his eyes sideward wondering if this man was just plain stupid or perhaps braver than he looked. 

“Is that any way to talk about a lady?” John picked up a stick off the ground and began to snap it into tiny pieces. In his mind, they were bones. 

“You’re a fine one to talk,” the man scoffed. “I make it my business to know about people in this place and I heard stories about you, boy.”

“I ain’t no boy,” the remainder of the twig was crushed in John’s fist which was almost shaking with rage. His eyes though calm were giving the man a false sense of security. “And my life is my business, nobody else’s.” 

“Interesting words for a man who’s sitting there judging me regarding mine. You’re just angry I’m gonna fuck her before you.”

In a flash the man was on the floor with John’s hand around his neck. His eyes bored into the man’s telling him silently that he wouldn’t live to take another breath. Silence fell across the field as everyone watched on, nobody in a hurry to intervene. The only sound that could be heard was the sound of the man’s neck cracking beneath the pressure of the hand around it and his desperate gasps for air. Suddenly, John let go and stood to his feet. 

“You ain’t even worth killing,” he spat in the man’s face, showing him exactly what he thought of him.

He glanced around and he didn’t know why but he hated himself when he saw her looking at him with an unreadable expression in her green eyes. It was in that moment that he remembered the reason he sought out whores and random women for fun. It was because they were all a man like him deserved. His life was ugly and so was he; not in the physical sense but his soul was ugly. He did things no God fearing man should ever do and called it survival. The truth was that while he didn’t believe in the big man up in the sky, he believed in something. He believed that when his time came he would go to a place reserved for the darkest of souls. It had never bothered him before but maybe that was because he had never before imagined how it might feel to share his life with another person. 

“Mr Fitzgerald!” 

He didn’t stop walking until the voice called for him again and the girl appeared in front of him, breathless and rosy cheeked, blocking his path. He could have walked around her or moved her out of the way easily, but she was so close and she smelled like wildflowers and he found himself frozen to the spot. 

“Your name is Mr Fitzgerald, isn’t it?” she craned her neck to look up at him because she barely reached the base of his throat. 

“Mmhmm,” he nodded. “John Fitzgerald.”

“I just wanted to say thank you, Mr Fitzgerald,” she smiled, showing teeth that were white and straight and not a single one missing. 

He frowned. What would she be thanking him for exactly? 

“I heard what he was saying,” she explained, seeing the confusion on his bearded face. 

“You did?” 

“Yeah,” she nodded. “His voice kinda carried.”

“Hmm,” was all he could reply with. He wanted to apologise for having behaved as himself but he wasn’t sorry for what he did. He was only sorry she had witnessed it. 

“I’m really grateful to you. I’ve seen him around a few times over the last couple of days and he makes me feel uncomfortable. When I saw him watching me tonight, I felt better knowing you were there too.” 

“Why?” he muttered before he even realised it. 

“I don’t know,” she shrugged and then smiled bashfully as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “You make me feel safe.” 

“You definitely don’t know me if you think that,” he grunted, his fingers itching to reach out and touch the light dusting of freckles on her nose. 

“On the contrary, I think I do. And Mr Fitzgerald, I like what I see.”

“On the outside perhaps,” he acknowledged with a tilt of his head. “But on the inside, I am not a man that a lady like you wants to be associated with.” 

“Well it’s a good job that’s my decision to make and not yours,” she grinned impishly. “I’ll see you around, Mr Fitzgerald.” 

Gracefully, she slid past him and he found himself reaching for her hand with a gentleness he didn’t even know he possessed. 

“You know my name,” he murmured, noticing the way her pupils widened as his thumb moved in slow circles around her palm. “Ain’t it only fair I know yours.”

“Haversham,” she smiled. “Lily Haversham.”

Now it was John’s turn to smile; an expression that was almost foreign upon his face. He didn’t want to survive anymore; he wanted to live because finally he knew he had a reason. 


End file.
